Ever wondered what happened to Claus Grabke? Why all his board graphics had clocks in them? Ask no more.....have a look at this exhibition of every Grabke board at the Skateboardfieber museum in Germany.....
"Without doubt Claus Grabke is the european Skateboard legend ! No other German Skater had ever such a commanding position as Claus had in the 80ies and 90ies. From Titus Skates (1983) he went to Powell Peralta (1985),to Madrid (1986) and later in the same year to Santa Cruz Skateboards. "



Other skaters are interested in time and time travel too.....shame the Clause Grabke tribute section of This n That isn't on this clip....

Trevor Johnson came down to Wales with the Kettering weekend roadtrip crew in July...here's a couple of lines from Chepstow bowl and Ally's warehouse ramp.....

Trev in Wales from Jono on Vimeo.

Ray Underhill video section from one of the Powell Videos....check the intro out, often quote this in my head when in the same situations, Paris, French Riviera, art galleries etc etc......insert your name and starsign.

Young Offenders video....freight trains, guitars....what more do we need???

A day at Cuckfield skatepark and i left unable to walk, over a week later and i still can't do a lot...i fell from a rocknroll thinking i'd made it and next thing i was down, i must have twisted to protect my knee and pulled/torn or strained something around my hip or groin which began to hurt a couple of days later....still weak from my broken leg well over a year ago i'm trying to build things up and get some of my strength back....today i was forgetting my weakness and thinking i could do anything, sort of anyway, been watching a lot of Thrasher videos lately and had more ideas above my station! Rocknroll's aren't hard but i got a bit tied up in the turn back in and either caught my front wheels on the coping or under rotated on the way in and because i'd figured i'd made it ti was a slam rather than a step off or bail.....the whole occasion must have fired me up and i forgot my limits, not imposed by my head but by my body. Try as i might to speed things up with walking, cycling, running, skating, swimming and whatever else i could do it didn't seem to take much to bring me down...not giving in though, from being carried out of the bowl by the mutie reunion crew to crawling up the stairs to hobbling around with the aid of an ikea fold away wooden chair i'll be back in the bowl in no time....gotta remember to fit in some training for the Cardiff half marathon at the end of October too.
Siobhan took the group pic and Len took my pic.

And a quick burst of Youth of Today when they played down at S.O.A.S. in London in March of the same year.....Tim was there too, way before i knew him....heckling the band by all accounts.

On the 8th November 1989 Gorilla Biscuits played at The Fulham Greyhound near Hammersmith in London....the pub long ago became a generic chain "pub" but in the late 80's and early 90's it was one of the London venues for cool tunes....
This is part one of the gig which i recorded on my walkman, one of the most memorable shows i have ever been to!
The sound is pretty good considering, i have cleaned it up a bit but sounds pretty good to me. First few minutes are slightly glitchy but stick with it........

Cuckfield is always good, rare to see many people there, easy transitions, metal coping and a hip on both sides into the shallow part. Some of the bottom part of the transitions are coming apart so a bit of an unexpected bump in parts but thats being too picky....skating at Market Harborough for years and cracks and uneven concrete are a part of skating. All these perfect parks and smooth concrete have meant that people have become spoilt.....what's needed is someone to build cracks into the design of parks like in the good old days.
Got a few clips from our trip on Saturday....me, Matt, Len and Sunay got an early start and mainly had the place to ourselves. A quick rough chuck together of the clips but more fine tuning and a plan that might come together sometime soon. John hinted at a get together of the old Rowell/ Desborough faces....Matt thought of a possible rent a night at Skaterham where we could meet up and have an indoor park to ourselves for a pretty small price....catch up and have a skate and perhaps recreate Jess's photo from our big trip to Stevenage all those years ago!!!

Liz asked me to take some pictures at Blast Off in Nottingham.....i only went to Friday night but the whole thing lasted 3 days and was an amazing feat of organisation on her part, it's a scary prospect putting on 2 nights at the Marcus Garvey which is a huge room...the thing is they pulled it off and what i saw on Friday night was fantastic. Here's some of what i saw and thanks Liz for getting me to come. Armitage Shanks played Shirts Off and it was already worth the drive up from Swansea!

Los Chicos at Blast Off from Jono on Vimeo.

Rollapaluza in the Philippines this week using the dial i painted a few weeks ago....

rollapaluza phil tv from fatboyralph on Vimeo.

The thriller in Manilla

Boardroom bowl in 2008....the bowl we built still looks as good
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Confidence comes back really slowly...took a trip up to cuckfield with rob and ione to try and speed up it's return.

Alan was back from New Zealand for a holiday so it was a good excuse for a big old road trip to South Wales. Ally put the whole thing together at the Welsh end; all the spots, place to stay, new clothes for everyone, cheap surfboard deals....the Barr hospitality is legendary. I live in Swansea right now so i hooked up with Ally on Porthcawl seafront early and headed out in the Independent van to meet everyone at the Chepstow bowls...everyone was already skating when we got there, carving the bowls and getting as many in the bowl at one time as possible.....Kettering skaters seem to do this at every opportunity....i'm thinking of Romford last year when at least 30 tried to break some kind of coffin record down the big slalom hill into the bottom resevoir...maybe it was a record, i don't know and Kettering neither know nor care, it's just what they do. I think it comes from the long days and big bowls at Wicksteed park. Anyway it continues and i'm sure it always will.....






You gotta love the team shot......June 2009, Chepstow.

Team shot number 2.....Stevenage round about 1988, from the archive of Jess...3 of these fine looking fellas made it to the Chepstow pic...21 years later!!!

My charity bike ride......
Doing the London to Brighton a week on Sunday with Rob, any sponsorship will be gratefully received by the British heart Foundation, link below.....
As far as me goes it will be the longest i will have riden since i broke my leg just over a year ago....Clapham Common to Brighton seafront with over 40,000 others, might be a bit slow going but a few pics and clips should follow....
sponsor me here


Training rides have mainly consisted of taking ione out for afternoon rides to the park, she generally falls asleep on the back sometime on the way back.

Painted in white on black to get the strongest possible red for the finished dial.

The painted dial seems like an ongoing project, here is the painting process so far for the most recent model....it's a replacement for the thinner version i did last year that got damaged and buckled in the hot south london sun a couple of weeks ago. It's for a 1km 4 up dial so it will have four hands instead of the regular 2. Four hands means Four bikes racing. A roller racing Madison.....

Handpainted Rollapaluza Dials keeping me busy in the early hours after Ione has gone to bed...i got down to Herne Hill Velodrome to see the fruits of my labour. I can see the improvement in each one....they all look pretty nice from a distance though which is how they are mainly seen.